A Place Called Home
by Azcadelja
Summary: Neal is 15 years old and the best con his age. But when Peter catches him, he finally finds a place where he belongs. Father/son relationship. Now finished.
1. Chapter 1

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 1**

~ o O o ~

"Okay, where's the witness?" It had been a long and tiring day. They had gotten an anonymous tip about the stolen paintings—a case they had been working on for months. It seemed a group of thieves made their way through every museum in New York, stealing all paintings of the most famous artists they could get their hands on.

Since they had no other leads on the case yet, the tip had come at exactly the right time. So then they had waited for hours near the alley where the exchange of the stolen goods was supposed to take place. And when Peter had finally decided to stretch his legs a bit and went to get dinner, _that's _when it had all gone down, of course.

The criminals must have had a quick getaway plan, though, because according to what Diana had told him over the phone, they seemed to have vanished into thin air. Luckily, Peter's team have picked up a witness who could hopefully help them I.D. at least one of the crooks.

So now Peter was back at the bureau and looking around the bullpen to see if he could make out the witness Diana and Jones had brought back with them. At this point, he just wanted to get the witness statement over with so he could go home and hopefully not think about work until Monday.

Diana pointed to a boy, maybe fourteen or fifteen years old, who was currently showing a card trick to Jones.

"You're kidding me! That's a kid!" That was just what this day needed!

Diana shrugged her shoulders in a manner that clearly implied, _What can you do? _and then said, "Have fun, Boss. I'm off—got a date with Christie."

"What?" Peter looked incredulously after her as she stalked off towards the elevators. Okay, he had promised her she could leave early today, but that was before they had lost half a day sitting in the van waiting for something to happen.

In that moment, Jones saw him and hurried over. "Peter, so glad you're here! That means babysitting duty is over, right?"

Peter ignored that question and instead concentrated on the problem at hand. "Catch me up, Jones."

"Not much to catch up on. Nick over there was on his way home, taking a short-cut through the alleyway. Apparently, all he saw was the guys jumping into a minivan and driving off."

Peter looked over at Nick, who was sitting in Jones's chair, going through his drawers. Jones noticed that too and sighed.

"Yeah, I think he has ADHD or something. Can't take your eyes off of him for one second," he explained and went over to Nick to take a file out of his hands that the kid had been just about to nose through.

Peter followed Jones and smiled at the boy. "Hello, Nick," he said. "My name is Agent Peter Burke. I'd like to ask you some questions about what you saw in that alleyway. Mind coming up to my office? It's quieter up there."

Nick fixed him with a pair of very blue eyes and seemed to assess him. Then, he smiled a bright smile that could rival the sun, and said, "Sure thing, Agent Burke."

He stood up, finally letting Jones have his chair back, and picked up one of those backpacks that kids carried around these days before following Peter who led the way up to his office.

"So, Nick," Peter said as he sat down, indicating for Nick to do the same. "I hear you saw the men we're looking for get into a minivan." He waited for the boy to nod before he went on. "Can you describe it to me?"

"Dunno." Nick shrugged. "It was white."

"Okay. Good. That's good." Peter wrote that down and looked up again expectantly. "Anything else?"

"Not really."

"Like, what model, how many doors, license plate number ...?"

"I don't really make a habit out of memorizing license plates."

Oh great. A smart-ass! "What about the men, then? Can you tell me something about them?"

Nick chewed on his bottom lip and seemed to think hard, but then he just shrugged again. "Sorry."

"Well, let's start with how many there were."

"Two. Or three . . . maybe more. I can't really say for sure." Peter put his pen down and shot the boy in front of him a disbelieving look. "I wasn't really paying attention," Nick defended himself. "There were a few guys who got into a car and drove off and then there were FBI agents all over the place."

"I'm sure you noticed _somet_hing about them. What clothes they were wearing, height, hair color; did they carry something, maybe load it into the van?"

"Don't think so." The kid was starting to give him a headache. This was what you got when you had a teenager for a witness! Before Peter could think of further questions, Nick continued, "Can I get a coffee or something? I've been stuck here for about a half an hour and no one even offered."

"Are you even allowed to have coffee?"

"Excuse me?" Nick looked affronted. "I'm fifteen, not five. And it's not like I'm asking for a glass of wine here."

Peter sighed and looked through the glass walls of his office to see if he could get someone else to get them something to drink, but no one was walking by. He sighed again and got up. "You," he said, pointing at Nick, "think of what you saw. Any little detail you can remember might be helpful. Anything at all."

With that, he left to get a good strong cup of coffee for himself and some teenager-friendly drink for Nick. He kept looking up at his office to make sure Nick was behaving himself—he didn't trust that kid—but whenever he looked at him, Nick just looked innocently back and one time even waved at him with a wide smile on his face.

When he got back to his office, Nick was clearly starting to get bored. He rocked his chair backwards and forwards and Peter expected him to fall off any second now.

"Stop that," he said—he didn't want to end this day by driving an injured teenager to the hospital. He put the cup in front of the boy and sat down again.

Nick immediately went for his cup and took a long swig. Then he put the cup down. "Cocoa? You shouldn't have."

"You're welcome."

"No, seriously, you shouldn't have." Nick suddenly reached over, trying to snatch Peter's cup of coffee, but Peter was faster than him and picked it up to take a sip himself.

"So, about that van and the men?" Peter tried to steer the conversation back on track.

"Yeah, I remembered something. There might have been some sort of sticker on the back of the van. A dog or something."

"A sticker of a dog?" Peter mumbled, making a note of that tidbit of information.

"Yeah. So, can I go now? That was everything I know anyway and I'm already late for dinner. My parents are probably worried by now." Nick made a grab for his backpack, but Peter held up a hand and signaled him to sit back down.

"Jones didn't give your parents a call?"

"Uhm . . ."

Peter picked up the phone on his desk. "What's your number?"

"No, seriously, that's fine. I'm often late. They probably haven't even realized I'm late yet. I was just saying that so that you'd let me go home."

Peter gave him his best no-nonsense look, waiting for Nick to tell him his phone number so that he could appease his parents, who were probably worried sick by now.

"I can call them myself," Nick finally said and before Peter could say or do anything else, he had his cell phone out and hit a number on speed-dial.

"Hey, Dad, it's Nick . . . Yeah, I'm fine. Some federal agent thinks I can help him solve a case . . . No, really." Peter made signs to let Nick know that he wanted to talk to his father, but Nick simply ignored him and went on. "Look, I'll tell you everything when I'm home . . . I already did my homework. Yeah. I'll see you in about half an hour—" Peter shook his head. "An hour—"

"Give me that!" Peter held his hand out for Nick's cell, but Nick ignored him once more.

"Listen, Dad, Agent Burke wants to talk to you . . . No, I'm not in trouble . . . I can take care of myself, too . . ."

Okay, that was it. Peter reached over and snatched the cell out of Nick's hands. Nick looked stunned, but Peter turned away from him and spoke into the phone.

"Hello, Mister—" That's when Peter realized that Jones hadn't told him Nick's last name. There was a long pause at the other end of the line. "Hello?" Peter tried again.

"Halden," came a reply at last. "And who is this?"

Peter noticed out of the corner of his eye that Nick began to fidget and that he was intently focused on Peter and the phone conversation. Peter let Nick's father know what was going on and gave him the address to the bureau so he could come pick up his son. Finally, he hung up the phone and gave it back to Nick.

"Your father will be here in half an hour. So, since you don't have anything better to do until then, how's about you try to think back to earlier this evening . . ."

Nick groaned and slumped down in his chair. Peter felt that he should be the one to groan; after all he had rarely had a witness as unhelpful as Nick was. But he suppressed the urge and simply asked questions, hoping to jog Nick's memory, until his father arrived. Since it was evident that the little information he had gotten out of Nick was all he was going to get, he thanked father and son and decided to call it a day himself.

**~ o O o ~**

Neal and the man who had come to get him out of that fed-trap walked in silence for a couple of blocks until they walked around a corner where Matthew was waiting for them.

"My money?" asked the guy, instead of offering a greeting.

Keller gave him a bundle of banknotes. After checking that it was all there, the guy walked off with a last nod at Keller.

"Did you get it?" Apparently greetings had gone out of style.

But Neal was accustomed to it, so he just replied, a bit affronted, "Of course!" He opened his backpack and fished out a folder. "Here. They don't have much on you, and you're pretty far down on their list of suspects anyway."

"Good job," Keller said as he opened the folder and skimmed the first page, while ruffling Neal's hair with his left hand absent-mindedly. Neal hated it when he did that. It was condescending. Just because Keller was an adult and Neal was not, he thought he could tell Neal what to do and have him do it all the time. As soon as Neal had enough money of his own, he'd definitely part ways with Keller. Speaking of which . . .

"Where's my share?"

Keller looked up from the file he was reading, laughed a dirty laugh, and took out his wallet. "Trying to play business man, huh? Here," he gave Neal a banknote, "go buy yourself a lolli or something." With that, he went back to reading. Condescending bastard!

Neal looked at the bill in his hand. "A twenty? You have got to be kidding me! You sent me right into the lion's den! I think that deserves a bit more than a rusty old twenty!"

"Well," Keller looked up once more, this time looking a bit irritated, "I'm also giving you a place to sleep and food to eat, now aren't I? You should be more grateful, Caffrey."

"That's not fair! I had to talk to _feds_. They could have locked me up!" How could he ever make it on his own if he didn't even get paid for the dangerous jobs?!

"And you almost messed it all up. I had to send someone in to get you out, which cost me your share for the job. Come to think of it—" Keller snatched the twenty out of Neal's hands, ignoring Neal's _Hey!_, "I don't think you even deserve this."

"They didn't know it was a set-up. They didn't know I was involved. _And _I didn't give them anything useful they could follow up on in their investigation. It's not my fault I'm a minor and Agent Burke wanted to call my parents."

"Tell you what, kiddo." Keller put an amicable hand on Neal's shoulder, which he shrugged off angrily. "You help me with the Guggenheim job next week and I'll give you ten percent."

Neal wanted to stay mad, but the prospect of being part of an actual heist was just too alluring. "I can come to the actual break-in?!" he asked excitedly. Up until now, Keller had only had him paint some forgeries, but he had never actually participated in a good art heist. Plus, ten percent of possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars might be a good start for his plan to make it on his own.

"Sure. We could use the extra pair of hands."

Neal simply couldn't wait for next week.

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are much appreciated.**


	2. Chapter 2

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 2**

~ o O o ~

Peter was in a good mood. Jones had just brought him a lead on the minivan with the dog sticker—maybe this was finally the break in the case they had been waiting for.

"Diana. Can you give the Haldens a call and tell them to come in as soon as possible?" he asked.

"The Haldens?"

"Yeah. You know, the witness from the other day? Maybe if we show Nick a picture of the van, he can confirm whether it's the one we're looking for." And if they were lucky, maybe he'd even be able to identify the owner, too.

"You got it, Boss."

"Oh, and one more thing."

Diana, who had already been on her way to make the requested phone call, turned around, arching her eyebrow.

"Have you seen my copy of the case file? I thought I locked it into my desk drawer, but it's not there."

Diana shook her head. "Sorry. Want me to make another copy for you?"

"That'd be great, thanks."

Peter went back into his office and went through his drawers one more time, but the file still didn't turn up. Maybe one of his other agents had taken it.

In that moment, Diana stepped into his office.

"Bad news," she said. "The phone number listed on the contact sheet is not in service."

"Well, just look it up in the phone book then. Maybe Nick got a digit wrong when writing it down," Peter said distractedly, still trying to figure out where he could possibly have put that damned folder.

"Doubtful. Unless he got a few letters wrong when he wrote down the address, too."

"What?" That made him look up and forget all about missing files.

"He gave us fake contact information. These are no good," Diana said, putting the contact sheet in front of Peter on his desk.

Peter stared at the pages in front of him. A kid! They had been played by a _kid!_

"I knew something was up with this kid!" He should have known. Nick had been way too unhelpful for an innocent witness. "He was suspicious from the beginning!" With those innocent blue eyes looking up at him, being all 'Sure thing, Agent Burke.' _Sure thing, my ass!_

"Is that why you let him walk right out the front door?"

Peter simply shot her a dark look, which only made her grin wider.

**~ o O o ~**

A few hours later, Peter was standing at the head of the table in the conference room. On the TV screen, there was a picture of the man who had claimed to be Nick's father that had been taken from the security cameras on Friday and one that showed a mug shot of the same man.

Peter pointed at the screen while addressing his team, "This is Jefferson Porter. He's a small-time criminal and left the country for Europe last Friday, using one of his aliases, Robert Innings. Unfortunately, he's Interpol's problem for now."

He pushed a button on the remote control and a picture of 'Nick' appeared on the screen.

"We have no idea who this is, though. Probably a runaway, so I want you to check every report of juvenile runaways. Start with New York, the Tri-State Area and then you can branch out if need be."

"Of the last few months?" someone interjected.

"Of however long you have to go back. I want to know who this kid is!—Now, any more questions?" He looked around the conference room. When no one spoke up, he dismissed his team, "Then get to work!"

Peter himself was flipping through files, too, in an attempt to find 'Nick', but so far, no luck. He began to think that the kid may not be a runaway after all. Maybe his parents were in on the thefts. But then he flipped over a page and a familiar looking pair of blue eyes looked right at him.

Peter skimmed the information about the boy given in the report and a grin spread across his face. "Neal Caffrey. Gotcha!"

**~ o O o ~**

New York was always a busy city, which was one aspect Neal liked about it. Always lots of people around and lots of pockets just waiting to be picked.

He went through the wallets he had just acquired. Not too much cash—unfortunately, it was all about the credit cards these days. But he wasn't really out to make lots of money today, anyway. Instead, he was mainly trying to distract himself.

They still had to wait a few days until they could execute the heist because Keller still had to figure out how to bypass security. Or, more accurately, he had someone else figure that out. Apparently, this was a three-man job. Neal thought it was unnecessary to involve a third party—they could so do this on their own—but he wasn't going to complain as long as he was a part of the heist.

Neal threw the wallets away and took out his own—, which at the moment was empty except for a few fake I.D.s and a ten dollar bill—, which he had taken out of Agent Burke's wallet the other day. That was the only money he had made off that job since Keller didn't pay him. Neal could have taken more out of Burke's wallet, obviously, but it had been more about the rush of picking the pocket of a federal agent than anything else.

Now he was somehow reluctant to spend those ten dollars, though. That's why he took out the ten dollar bill and put it into his jeans' pocket before putting the money from the other wallets into his.

**~ o O o ~**

Saturday night had Peter and his team sitting in the van near the Guggenheim museum.

So far, their lead on Neal Caffrey had been yet another dead end. They had spoken to the foster home he had run away from, but no one there had any idea where they could even begin looking for the kid. Obviously, looking into that minivan had been a waste of time, too—which was no wonder, since Neal had most likely fed them false information, anyway.

So they were back to trying to anticipate the thieves' next move, which had brought them to the Guggenheim. This was the third night in a row that they spent on stakeout and the thieves still hadn't shown up.

This promised to be yet another long night ahead of them . . .

**~ o O o ~**

Neal couldn't believe he was carrying a real Degas. This was the best night ever! There was an undeniable thrill about robbing a museum at night. Even though it felt a little bit like cheating, simply disabling the security system and then just taking the paintings they were after in the middle of the night. If it were up to Neal, he'd go about it with a lot more finesse. But still—he had a real Degas in his hands!

They put the stolen paintings into the trunk of the car and that's when Keller and the other guy—Davis or something—started arguing.

"I already have a fence," Keller said. "Once I get the money, we'll split it like we discussed."

"I don't think so! If I let you take off with the paintings right now, I'll never see my money."

"You'll just have to trust me."

"Well, see, that's the problem. I don't. I've heard how you screwed over Ray. I'll take my fifty percent right now!" He went to take one of the paintings out of the trunk, but Keller suddenly pulled out a gun.

"Hey, Matt . . ." Neal interjected placatingly. He hadn't even known Keller _had_ a gun and he didn't like this at all.

"Shut up, Caffrey," Keller said without taking his eyes off of Davis. "This is between grown-ups!"

"Oh please!" Davis said rolling his eyes. "Take that thing down. This is ridiculous!"

"You know, Frank, I don't really need you anymore. And one hundred percent sounds a lot better than fifty, now doesn't it?"

Keller had a creepy gleam in his eyes that sent chills down Neal's spine. He had never seen this side of him before. He wanted to say something, to make Keller see sense, but he suddenly realized that he couldn't talk. His eyes were glued to the gun in Keller's hands.

Davis seemed unimpressed, however. He took a few steps towards Keller and said, "As if you would really shoot me right here."

Neal held his breath. But after a few seconds that seemed to go on forever, Keller took his gun down and put it away. "You're right. I wouldn't."

Davis smiled haughtily and turned back to the car in order to get his share for the job.

In that moment, with Davis's back turned to him, Keller stepped up behind him, and rammed a knife into his side that he had produced seemingly out of nowhere.

"Doesn't mean I'm gonna just let you walk away with my goods, though," Keller told Davis, shoving the knife into him deeper and twisting it, before pulling it out and letting Davis slide to the ground.

Then he took out a handkerchief and swiped the knife clean, completely unperturbed, before looking over at Neal. "He was a real pain in the ass, huh?"

Neal had a hard time looking away from Davis's dead body. A lot of blood had pooled around him and his eyes were wide open in shock.

But as Keller took a step towards Neal, he finally snapped out of his paralysis, turned on his heel and ran as fast as he could away from that murdering psychopath.

His heart was pounding a mile a minute, but he didn't dare slow down to check if Keller was close behind. He had no idea where he was even running to; he just knew he had to put as much distance between Keller and himself as possible. He was a good sprinter—he would be able to outrun Keller. Wouldn't he?

After a while, he finally dared to look over his shoulder without slowing down to see if Keller was chasing him—and ran straight into someone.

He fell backwards onto his ass and as his eyes slowly traveled upwards to see whom he had run into, his mind raced. Keller couldn't possible have taken a short-cut? Wasn't that how horror movies always played out? Just when you thought you had left the bad guy behind, he came from the front, or the side, or somewhere else unexpected. But Keller wouldn't _kill_ him—he still needed him. Or did he?

"If it isn't 'Nick Halden'," a familiar voice said; and the next moment, someone helped him up and he stared up at none other than Agent Peter Burke of the White Collar division.

"Just going for a midnight run around the Guggenheim, I presume?"

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**I want to thank all of you guys who took the time to leave me a review on the first chapter—I treasure each and every one, and you certainly helped me stay motivated and sit down to write when I would normally have slacked off. I hope you also had fun with the second chapter? I wish you all a great weekend!**


	3. Chapter 3

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 3**

~ o O o ~

"_If it isn't 'Nick Halden'," a familiar voice said; and the next moment, someone helped him up and he stared up at none other than Agent Peter Burke of the White Collar division._

"_Just going for a midnight run around the Guggenheim, I presume?"_

**~ o O o ~**

"Peter," Neal said distractedly, looking back over his shoulder one more time. But Keller was nowhere to be seen. "What a small world." His voice came out a lot shakier than he had gone for.

He had a fleeting thought about just making a run for it, but Agent Burke seemed to sense that and put a hand on his shoulder to make sure he stayed put.

Neal tried to shrug the hand off, but Peter held on tight. Not that he needed to. Neal was safest where he was right now and he wouldn't risk leaving that safety. After all, Keller might be lying in wait for him just waiting to catch him alone and ram a knife into him.—And what a strange thought that was, associating a fed with safety! But when it came down to it, a murdering maniac trumped even the feds any day.

Neal realized that Agent Burke had been talking to him while he had gone through his options in his mind, and was now looking at him strangely.

"Uhm . . . Come again?"

"I said, you're going to have to come with us," Agent Burke repeated, still not letting go of him.

"Yeah. I figured." _Get me out of here_, he didn't say. But that's because he didn't have to—Peter was already leading him to his car.

**~ o O o ~**

Back at the bureau Peter put Neal in the interrogation room and sat down opposite him. The kid hadn't said a word on the whole drive back. He had just had a zoned-out expression on his face and even now Peter had a hard time getting him to pay attention to the interview. He seemed nervous, kept fidgeting and looking over his shoulder. Well, he _should_ be nervous. If he was in league with the group of thieves, he could be sent to juvie for a long time.

Not that they had any real proof. They had found nothing on him, no paintings or forgeries, nothing that could connect him to any crimes. But Neal didn't have to know that . . .

"So, _Neal_," Peter began. The kid's eyes, that had just roamed the room, snapped up at Peter's use of his real name. "You gave us a fake name, huh?"

To Peter's surprise, it only took about half a second for Neal to school his expression again. "That's what my friends call me. Neal, Nick—pretty similar, don't you think?" He flashed a smile, showing his perfect white teeth.

"Don't get too cocky, kid. Obstruction of justice, ever heard of that?"

"It's just a name," Neal shrugged. "It's not like it makes a difference what you call me." He kept smiling at him, but the smile looked rather brittle and as if it took a great effort to maintain it.

Not for the first time tonight did Peter think that, most likely, something went wrong with that heist. Something more than Neal getting caught. He had agents checking the security cameras of the museum to make sure none of the paintings had gone missing. They would know soon enough.

"So, since you're no witness this time—what were you doing in front of the Guggenheim museum in the middle of the night?"

"Must have been sleepwalking," came the prompt response.

"Sleepwalking? That's what you want to go with?" Peter asked incredulously. Neal was seriously off his game tonight if he really thought that would fly as an excuse. He had been much more believable as the casual witness who just wanted to go home to his parents for dinner. Of course that was when Peter had still thought of him as a more or less normal teenage boy.

But before Neal could answer that, Jones came in and signaled Peter to follow him out of the interrogation room.

Once outside, he began to report, "The security cameras have been tampered with. Three paintings went missing. One Monet, one Van Gogh and a Degas."

"What? How could they have pulled this off? We were right there the whole time!"

"That's not the worst part," Jones interrupted him and from the look on his face, Peter could tell that he wouldn't like what he was about to say.

**~ o O o ~**

After Agent Burke had left him alone, Neal tried to get his thoughts sorted out. They kept coming back to the horrible images of a huge pool of blood, a dead body on the ground and a knife that was being wiped clean on a handkerchief. But he had to stay focused right now—Agent Burke could be back any minute. He thought over what he knew . . .

Fact #1: They knew his real name, which meant that they knew other stuff about him, too.

Fact #2: They couldn't really pin anything big on him. He could have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time. It would have been very coincidental and no way would Agent Burke believe that, but it was within the realm of possibility. And that meant that he could sell it if he could just get his act together. Innocent until proven guilty and all that.

Fact #3: He couldn't roll on Keller. Keller would find out and then he'd come after Neal and kill him, too. Because apparently, that's what he did to people who got on his nerves.

And, fact #4: If the feds sent him back to foster care, Keller would easily be able to track him down there. So maybe he should try and escape while it wasn't too late.

But how? Through the window wasn't an option. The White Collar division just _had_ to be on the twenty-first floor. Probably so that suspects couldn't escape through the windows. And it wasn't exactly the kind of place where you could easily blend in as a teenager.

That's when another thought struck him. What if Keller already knew that the feds had picked him up and waited for him outside? And even if that wasn't the case,—Neal had absolutely nowhere to go. He would have to leave the city or else risk Keller finding him. Suddenly, spending the night in lock-up didn't seem like such a bad thing after all. Maybe he should provoke Agent Burke enough so that he'd lock him up . . .

In that moment, Agent Burke came back into the room, a serious expression on his face.

"I know you're somehow involved in all this, so just make it easy on all of us and tell me what happened, and then I can try and help you."

That sounded like good cop and bad cop all in one. But one thing Neal had learned early on was to never confess to anything, so he tried to adopt an innocent expression as he replied, "I'm sorry. I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm talking about three stolen paintings and Frank Davis, stabbed to death near the museum where the break-in occurred."

_A knife rammed deep into Davis's guts and twisted hard. A body sinking to the ground. Eyes that are opened wide and staring lifelessly up at him. And a crazy gleam in Keller's eyes . . ._

"I would help you if I could," Neal said quietly and even meant it. He cast his eyes down looking at his hands that were folded in his lap.

Peter sighed. "Neal—you have got to give me something here if you don't want to end up in juvie till you are eighteen."

Neal's head snapped up at that. "I don't even _have_ any stolen paintings! If I had stolen them, wouldn't you have found them on me?"

"Three paintings go missing, a body turns up, and you come running into our arms—literally. You can see how it doesn't look good for you."

"What, you think _I _killed him?!"

"No. But I think you might have an idea who did," Agent Burke said and then added as an afterthought, "And I also think you know about those missing paintings."

Neal definitely couldn't confess to having been a part of the break-in. But maybe if he told them about Keller, the feds would take care of Keller for him and Neal could go back to living on the streets in peace.

"Look, Neal," said Peter who obviously took his silence to mean he didn't want to cooperate. "I can't help you if you don't help me."

Peter really seemed to want to help him and Neal started to believe that maybe he could, so he gathered up his courage and began hesitantly, "So, theoretically speaking, say I knew something about . . . something."

He cast a quick look at Peter to gauge his reaction and got a half encouraging, half expectant look in return.

"In that case it would be really dumb of me to blurt that out to some fed—eral agent. I mean that could make me a target of the guy—or woman—who killed that man. Theoretically," he added again for good measure.

Peter looked him straight in the eye, making it almost impossible for Neal to look away from him, and said in a calm and reassuring voice, "Whoever's behind this—they can't get to you here."

When Neal didn't say anything to that, he continued, "I'll make you a deal. You tell us what you know, I keep you safe while we do our jobs and put whoever did this behind bars, and once they are in prison, they won't be able to come after you anymore. How's that sound?"

Keller in prison did sound like a good idea. "Would you go arrest him right now?" Neal asked.

"Depends on what you can tell me. But if you know who killed Frank Davis—yeah, we'd arrest him as soon as possible."

Which meant that this could all be over and done with by morning. Agent Burke would probably send him back to foster care, but it wasn't like he hadn't escaped from there before. Making a decision, Neal spoke up again, "I know who killed Davis."

Or was it really such a good idea to turn Keller in? Keller knew people. What if he could get someone else to come after him?

"Who did, Neal?" Peter's patient voice penetrated his thoughts.

"Matthew," Neal said, unsure of himself once more.

_Keller's eyes bore into him, his voice calm and collected as if he were talking about the weather and hadn't just taken a man's life in such a brutal way, "He was a real pain in the ass, huh?"_

"Does Matthew have a last name?"

Neal mumbled something under his breath.

"What was that?"

"Keller," Neal said a bit louder and then took a deep breath before he repeated more confidently, "Matthew Keller."

**~ o O o ~**

The interview that followed was like pulling teeth. Neal seemed to switch back and forth between being honest and helpful, and . . . not being helpful at all. While Peter suspected that his behavior was most likely due to his own involvement in some of the cases, it was starting to get ridiculous.

For example, Neal heavily insinuated that Keller had also been responsible for the art heists they had been trying to solve, but whenever Peter tried to get specifics, he would get shifty and avoid a straight answer. He wouldn't tell him who painted the forgeries the thieves had used to replace some of the real paintings, and Peter seriously couldn't tell if he simply didn't know or just wasn't in the mood to tell him, hiding behind phrases like "in theory" or "allegedly". All in all, Neal turned out to be as much of a headache as his alias Nick had been.

What Peter had found out so far was that Neal had—allegedly—been out for a walk (yeah, right!) by the Guggenheim museum, when he had witnessed Keller kill Davis. At least Neal had told them where to find Keller and the stolen and as of yet unfenced items, which was all they needed to know for now, anyway.

So that's how Peter found himself bursting into Keller's apartment together with his team in the middle of the night, ready to make an arrest.

. . . But all they found was an empty apartment.

**~ o O o ~**

Neal briefly considered trying to con the agent Peter had left him with when they had been done with the interview. But he really wanted to stick around until he knew that Keller was safely behind bars. He could always run away later, be it from the center or from juvie, which sounded like an easy enough place to break out of, too—it's not like it was a maximum security prison or anything . . .

But at the moment it seemed like it would be back to foster care for him anyway. Agent Andrews was currently on the phone, trying to get a hold of someone who could come and get Neal. Which probably wasn't the easiest thing to do at—Neal glanced at his watch—two o'clock in the morning.

How long could it take to go arrest a guy, anyway? Shouldn't they have been back by now?

In that moment Neal's cell phone buzzed and when he took it out, he had a text message from an unknown number. He didn't need a number to recognize who it was from, though.

_You really shouldn't have done that, kiddo._

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**Thank you again for all your wonderful reviews****—y****ou guys make my day! I hope you enjoyed the new chapter and as always, I'm looking forward to hearing from you.**


	4. Chapter 4

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 4**

~ o O o ~

"The text message came from a burner phone," Jones said.

Peter pinched the bridge of his nose, closed his eyes and sighed.

"I told you," said Neal exasperatedly. The kid had been sitting quietly in the corner for a while now, which from what Peter already knew about him, didn't seem like him.

"Thanks, Jones," Peter addressed the agent without paying Neal's comment any attention. "Go home, you're tired. We'll pick this up on Monday."

"You can't just give up! You said you'd arrest him! So go arrest him!" Neal demanded angrily.

"We're not giving up," Peter tried to placate the upset teenager. "Tomorrow, you're going to tell me every little detail about Keller—aliases, places he used to go to . . . everything. And then we'll get him."

"But that will give him a few hours head start at least!" Neal protested. "Maybe we should—"

"You should have been in bed hours ago," Peter interrupted him who wasn't in the mood to get into a discussion about this with Neal. After a short pause he added, "_I _should have been in bed hours ago. Now, wait here, I'll go talk to Agent Andrews and see if he found some place for you to spend the night."

"What?" Neal shot him a betrayed look. "You promised you wouldn't let Keller get to me! Shouldn't I be, like, placed in witsec or . . . get a bodyguard or something?"

"You're going to be fine. I promised you I'd keep you safe and I will. Now, I'll be right back. Try not to get in trouble while I'm gone."

Unfortunately, Agent Andrews didn't have a magic solution for him. He was just about to go home, himself, leaving Peter alone at the bureau.

With a deep sigh Peter went back to his office to get Neal. When he stepped into his office, he saw the kid slumped down in his chair, his head on his arms, sound asleep. He looked innocent with his eyes closed, his hair falling into his face, breathing evenly in and out, and Peter could see how Neal could have fooled him that first day they had met. Even though he knew better now—the kid was far from innocent—Peter felt his heart constrict at the sight before him.

He was reluctant to wake the kid up—after the events of the day, it was no wonder that Neal was exhausted—, but he couldn't just leave him asleep in his office.

So he went up to him and softly shook him by the shoulder. The kid mumbled something and turned away from Peter's touch, blissfully sleeping on.

"Neal, wake up. I'm taking you home with me." He gave his shoulder another shake. "There's a perfectly comfortable bed in the guest room. I bet you'll sleep even better there."

Neal slowly blinked his eyes open and looked around confusedly for a second before his eyes settled on Peter.

"Did you catch him?" he asked sleepily, rubbing his eyes.

"No. But I will.—Come on."

**~ o O o ~**

Neal fell asleep again in the car on the way to Peter's house and only woke up when they arrived and Peter tried to get him out of the car.

"Oh, come on! At least carry _some_ of your own weight!" he heard Peter grumble, as he half dragged, half carried him into the house. And then he was somehow in a bed, and between one second and the next he was fast asleep again.

When he woke up, it was still pitch black outside. He couldn't have slept for more than an hour; something had woken him up. He lay very still in order to listen into the darkness, but he couldn't hear anything that might have woken him.

Neal tried to make something out in the dark, but his eyes wouldn't adjust. He then tried to grope for the nightstand to find a bedside lamp. And when he finally did and turned the light on, his heart almost stopped. Keller stood right above him, a knife in his right hand and his left index finger on his lips.

Neal frantically tried to scramble away from him, but his back was already against the wall and there was nowhere else to go.

Not knowing what else to do, he yelled as loud as he could for Peter. Keller held him down and tried to put his hand on Neal's mouth to shut him up, but Neal continued kicking and screaming in a constant stream, "Peter! Peter! Peter!"

And then the light was on, for real, and Keller was gone, had never been there, but Peter was, gun in hand, looking around the room, before he too realized that there was no danger. Neal's heart was still racing and he looked at Peter with wide open eyes, but before either of them could say anything, a woman who was wrapping a dressing gown around herself appeared behind Peter and asked, "What's going on?—Who _is_ that?"

Peter, who in the meantime had lowered his gun, turned to her. "I'm sorry, hon. I would have told you, but it was the middle of the night and I didn't want to wake you up . . ."

"I'm Steve Tabernacle, who're you?" Neal said, smiling at her and generally trying to appear as calm and collected as possible.

"Cut it out, Neal!—Hon, this is my . . . witness. Neal Caffrey. I wanted to tell you in the morning . . ."

"Who're you?" Neal repeated, who didn't like being ignored.

"I'm Elizabeth," the woman introduced herself and then turned to Peter. "Wait, _the_ Neal Caffrey? I thought you didn't have any idea where to even search for him."

"Well, we found him."

"I can see that."

"Nice to meet you, Elizabeth."

"You too, Neal."

In that moment, a dog came in, wagging its tail, nudging Peter's hand with its nose and then coming over to Neal. Apparently, the lab wanted to see what all the commotion was about.

"Satch, here!" Peter ordered and the dog gave Neal one last curious look before trotting over to his owner.

Elizabeth in the meantime had taken in Neal's attire and now admonished Peter, "You let him go to sleep in his _street clothes_?!"

"We didn't have any PJ's for kids lying around."

"'m not a kid," Neal interjected off-handedly, who was trying to get the dog to come back over to him.

"Did I mention that it was the middle of the night? It was really just a short-term solution. Tomorrow, we'll get this all sorted out."

"Actually, it already _is_ 'tomorrow.' It's almost time to get up anyway," Elizabeth said. "Should I go turn on the coffee machine?"

"Coffee sounds great!" Neal chimed in, which got him an exasperated look from Peter.

"Neal and I only went to bed about three hours ago, we'll go back to sleep and sleep in."

"I'm up," Neal protested, having no intention of going back to sleep; he was still a bit shaken from the nightmare.

"That's why I said 'go_ back_' to sleep.—Satch!"

Neal had finally gotten the attention of the lab and 'Satch' had trotted back over to the bedside to sniff at Neal.

"That's okay. He seems like a nice dog," Neal said, patting Satch.

"It's not you I'm concerned about," Peter said. "Maybe I don't want you to teach my dog any con tricks." But a teasing grin spread across his face that betrayed his words.

In that moment Elizabeth came back into the room—Neal hadn't even realized that she had been gone—, carrying a black T-shirt that was at least three times Neal's size, and equally large sweatpants.

"Here, sweetie, you can change into these for sleep," she said, putting the clothes on the foot of the bed.

"I'm not going back to sleep."

"But that's my favorite casual shirt!"

Neal and Peter had both spoken at the same time, but both shut up immediately at a stern look from Elizabeth.

"I'll be downstairs. You boys sleep well.—And we'll talk later," she added addressing Peter, before she left the room.

No one said anything for a few seconds. Neal was still patting Satch, who seemed to enjoy the attention, and Peter appeared indecisive about what to do or say. He finally settled on an awkward, "You okay?"

"Sure," Neal replied, scratching Satch between the ears.

"You do that a lot?"

Neal looked up to shoot Peter a questioning look.

"Scream in your sleep, I mean."

Neal felt himself blush and looked back at Satch. "Just testing to see what your response time is.—There's room for improvement, by the way."

"I was here within _seconds_, I'll have you know."

"Well, you do have a better response time than your guard dog, I guess . . ."

"Satchmo's not a guard dog. He likes everyone. Even juvenile felons, apparently," Peter said, shooting a meaningful look at Satchmo who had rolled onto his back to let Neal scratch his tummy.

"Alleged juvenile felons," Neal corrected automatically.

"Yeah, right." Peter rolled his eyes. "Go back to sleep, we'll talk about alleged felonies tomorrow." With that Peter turned around and was just about to leave the room, when Neal called after him, "You mean 'today'!"

Peter just shook his head and with a wave of his hand over his shoulder kept on walking, leaving the door ajar.

Neal stared after him for a long moment thoughtfully. For a fed, Peter wasn't half bad. And bantering with him and trying to push his buttons was a lot more fun than he was ready to admit.

"What do you say, Satch? Can your owner be trusted?"

Satchmo, of course, didn't have any opinion on the matter one way or another.

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**As always, I am incredibly grateful for your reviews and I'm very interested to hear what you thought of the new chapter. There's a long hiatus ahead of us until 5x01, so maybe fanfics can help make it seem shorter . . .**


	5. Chapter 5

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 5**

~ o O o ~

The plan had been to stay in his room for an hour or two and then go down to see about that coffee. But Neal must have fallen asleep again—a dreamless sleep, fortunately—because when he woke up again, it was already noon.

He made his way down the stairs and stopped halfway down when he heard Peter's voice.

"Yeah, I know it's Sunday, but . . . Yes, sir." Apparently he was talking to someone on the phone. "Will do . . . What about the kid? . . . Well, yes, but . . . Okay. Tomorrow, then."

Deciding that it was time to make his entrance, Neal took the rest of the stairs two at a time, making sure to make a lot of noise to announce his arrival, and joined Peter in the kitchen.

"Oh, hey," Peter greeted him. "If it isn't the boy who didn't want to go back to sleep. Sleep well?" he added with a smirk and a meaningful glance at the clock.

"Wow. Fed humor. Didn't know it existed," Neal retorted, spotting the coffee machine and making a bee-line for it.

"And how many federal agents do you know?" Peter asked, but when Neal opened his mouth to answer, he held up his hand and added, "Don't answer that."

"So, what do you eat for breakfast around here?" Neal asked, randomly opening drawers in search of something edible. "Never mind," he added, having found the stash of cereals and taking all three different kinds with him to the table.

"What?" he said when he felt Peter's eyes on him, staring at him incredulously. "I'm still growing."

"And Sugar Ohs are the healthy way to help you grow up." Despite his words, Peter handed Neal a bowl and a spoon, before opening the fridge and taking out the milk.

"Any plans for arresting Keller today?" Neal asked casually while he poured some milk into his bowl.

Peter sat down across from him with a sigh. "We can start working on that tomorrow."

Neal's head shot up. He had heard that sentence before. Yesterday, to be precise.

"But in the meantime, you can tell me everything about him that you can remember. Aliases, hide-outs, what he was planning next . . ."

"It won't do you any good. He knows I know. He won't go anyplace I know about or use any of his old aliases."

"That might be the case, but we have to start somewhere."

"Fine," Neal conceded, even though he wasn't thrilled that they'd basically be wasting another day. "But if I have to stay here for another day, we should stop by Keller's old apartment and go get my stuff."

"It's still under surveillance."

"So?" Neal asked, trying to follow the non sequitur.

"So, no."

"Oh come on! It's not like he'd be dumb enough to go back there anyway." It wasn't like Neal had a lot of stuff that belonged to him anyways: a few clothes and the hat that he wore for the occasional street con, and of course his art supplies—even though most of them belonged to Keller, too, and Neal was just allowed to use them.

"We can get you anything you need," Peter brought him out of his thoughts. "As a matter of fact, El is taking care of it as we speak."

"But . . ."

"End of discussion."

Neal looked down at his bowl and finished his cereal in silence.

"Oh, are you going to sulk now?"

"I just don't see why we can't go get my stuff. It'll take five minutes, tops."

Peter sighed. "Give it a couple days. Once we have Keller, you can get it."

Neal decided not to be mad at Peter for telling him no—even though he hated being told no, especially when he knew he was right—because a couple days didn't sound so bad. That was, until Peter said, "So. Let's talk house rules."

"House rules? What, you mean like 'No matter what happens, don't bring the cops back to my place'?"

Peter shot him a meaningful look.

"You just said I'm only going to be here for a couple days. You said, you'd get Keller."

"And we will," Peter affirmed. "But in the meantime—"

"What, you think it'll take you guys longer?"

"That's not what I meant . . ."

"Because I have to say, up till now I'm not very impressed by the level of competence displayed by the bureau. I mean, the infiltration was way easier than I would have imagined . . . Oh, and that reminds me", Neal searched his jeans pockets and took out a disassembled cell. "This is Agent Andrews's, he might want that back."

"You _stole_ that?"

"No, I didn't. Or else I wouldn't be giving it back right now, would I?"

Peter just shook his head disbelievingly. "You _stole_ that."

"I was bored. You took forever to not-arrest Keller, and I wanted to see how hard it was. Turned out, not very."

"Are you _trying_ to get into trouble with me?"

". . . and then you didn't even get the bad guy when you knew his name and where he lived . . ."

"Okay, okay, stop. There's already an APB out for Keller and we highly suspect he's still in the city—like I said, we'll get him. Trust me. In the meantime, just—don't steal anything and we should be fine. Deal?"

"Dunno. Does it count as stealing if I take one of those cookies?" Neal asked, pointing towards a bowl of cookies in the middle of the table.

Peter shot him an incredulous look. "You only _just_ ate."

"Still growing," Neal replied, reaching for one and taking a bite.

Peter just rolled his eyes. "One's enough. Don't want you to have a sugar crash."

Neal grinned around his cookie. "So, what are we going to do all day if we can't work on catching Keller and we can't go to my . . . I mean, _his_ place?"

Peter looked around the kitchen, obviously thinking about what to do. "You can help me walk Satch," he finally came up with.

"Help you? How many people does it take to walk one dog?"

"Wanna stay indoors doing chores instead? Because I can arrange that."

"Walking the dog sounds like lots of fun!" Neal said quickly, an enthusiastic and obviously fake grin on his face.

**~ o O o ~**

It turned out Neal did enjoy taking Satch to the park a lot. Peter and El were currently watching him run around with Satchmo, laughing and trying to outrun their dog at the same time.

"He sure is a whirlwind," Peter commented, careful to never let Neal out of his sight. That kid seemed to attract trouble like a magnet, and on top of that Peter wasn't sure if he was up to something—which was apparently par for the course with Caffrey.

"So, apart from the whole witness to a murder thing," interrupted Elizabeth his thoughts, "you want to tell me how it came that we have a teenager living in our guest room?"

"Delinquent teenager," Peter corrected automatically and then added, "I'm not helping my case, am I?"

El chuckled. "He doesn't look like he would ever even think of doing anything illegal."

"Yeah, looks can be deceiving. When he looks at you with those big innocent eyes? That's when you have to watch out. That mostly means that he's up to something."

"It certainly seems that you know him pretty well already."

Peter huffed out a laugh. "Yeah. Fool me once . . ."

"Well, I think it's nice that Satchmo has someone to play with. Although, poor Satch—he's not used to that much running around. Neal is really going to tire him out," she added with a laugh in her voice, as they watched Neal throw a stick as far as he could and Satchmo take off after it.

They stayed out far longer than they usually would. Neal had somehow convinced Peter to join in and play a strange game of 'Catch me if you can'—mostly by teasing him about how out of shape he was and that it was no wonder he couldn't catch his suspects. And even though he caught Neal in the end, the kid had given him quite a run for his money, and so Satchmo wasn't the only one who ended up exhausted.

But even though his muscles ached at the end of the day when all either of them could do was sit on the couch not really paying attention to the movie that was on TV, Peter had to admit to himself that he hadn't had that much fun in a long time.

**~ o O o ~**

Peter didn't know if he only woke up because he had fallen asleep on the couch earlier and his body simply wasn't tired anymore, or if he had heard something that had woken him up—probably the latter, seeing as it was still in the middle of the night. He decided to get up and check on Neal, just in case the kid was having another nightmare.

He opened the door to the guest room as quietly as he could and looked inside. The first glance didn't reveal anything unusual, since his eyes were still adjusting to the dark. But as soon as they did, Peter reached for the light switch and turned on the light to check what he had seen—or more specifically not seen. The window was open. Neal was gone.

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**I'm sorry for the delay in posting, I just wasn't very motivated to write lately. A huge thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter and who kept reminding me that they are interested in seeing this fanfiction continued. I've been thinking about how I could thank you for your reviews that bring me so much joy, and I prepared a surprise for you focused on the surrogate father son relationship between Neal and Peter. So if you left a review on the last chapter and you're interested, let me know and I'll send it to you via pm as a sort of "I'm sorry it took me so long to finish the next chapter."**

**I hope you enjoyed this chapter, even though there's a lot of talking going on, but that was necessary for the development of the story.**


	6. Chapter 6

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 6**

~ o O o ~

Neal was aimlessly walking down the night streets of New York. He had no idea where to go or what to do. All he had was the clothes he was wearing and a duffel bag with his stuff. Earlier, he had stopped by Keller's place, which had never felt like home, even though he had lived there for over a year.

Among the essentials for surviving his duffel bag contained were a bunch of fake IDs—some of which claimed he was of age. He could check into a hotel for the night, pay cash, and pick a few pockets tomorrow. He only had the ten bucks left that he had taken from Peter that very first day they met and a couple of twenties that he had taken out of Peter's wallet right before he left. He had felt oddly guilty about taking the money, even though it wasn't like it would hurt Peter—he could spare forty bucks. But he would probably be disappointed when he found out that Neal had broken the one rule he had laid down.

He should probably leave the city. He had never had any problems leaving part of his life behind. He would just take on a new alias and make a new life for himself. And it was high time he did that, getting away from Keller, from feds who would put him in juvie if they knew half of what he had done.

But thinking back to the day in the park, playing with Satch and even Peter, he felt very lonely all of a sudden and all he wanted was to be back in his room. But it _wasn't_ his room, it was just some fed's guestroom. Neal put his duffel bag down and sat down next to it on the sidewalk, burying his head in his arms.

He had never needed anyone to take care of him. At least not for a very long time. But it had been kind of nice not having to go out and pick pockets in order to buy something to eat. Just coming home from a fun day in the park and having dinner like it was the most normal thing in the world instead. Which had been nice, but also kind of scary. It had made him feel . . . something, which in return had only allowed the one choice: He had had to leave as fast as possible!

But now, here, all alone sitting on some sidewalk with no idea where to run, he started to realize that he hadn't really thought it through. Lying in his warm bed, not having to worry about cops picking him up or where to go and which alias to use sounded perfect right about now. And there was no way that the Burkes had already realized he was gone—he had waited until he was sure they were asleep.

So, he could just sneak back in and no one would be any the wiser. He could always make his escape at a later time, once he had a better plan. Once he had had a good night's sleep in a place he felt safe.

Making a decision, Neal stood up and made his way back.

**~ o O o ~**

Climbing down the rain water downpipe had been a lot easier than trying and climb back up. Neal was about to give up and just pick the lock and enter through the front door, when the porch light suddenly came on. Startled, Neal lost his footing, fell down the one foot he had managed to climb up the side of the house, and landed on his ass.

He scrambled back up and dusted off his trousers, before slowly looking up at the front door, where Peter stood, hands on his hips. Long seconds ticked by as they looked at each other in silence. Then, without saying a word, Peter held the door open and Neal quickly grabbed his duffel bag and ducked under Peter's arm to enter the house.

As soon as he was inside, Peter rounded on him. "Where the hell have you been?!"

"Out," Neal replied casually and shrugged his shoulders. "Why? What's up?"

"What's up? _What's up_?!" Peter repeated incredulously and really, there was no reason for him to yell at Neal like that. Or for his face to turn as red as it did, for that matter. "I have half the FBI out looking for you, _that's_ 'what's up.'"

"Geez, calm down," Neal said, putting his hands in his jeans pockets and thus mirroring Peter's stance with his hands on his hips in a more casual manner. "What's the big deal? I was just going for a walk."

"In the middle of the night!"

"So?"

Peter's eyes found the duffel bag at Neal's feet and he gave an exasperated huff. "You went back to _Keller's_ place?!"

"Your agents didn't even see me sneak in. Or out."

"Is that somehow supposed to make it better?"

"Well, yeah. I didn't disturb any surveillance," Neal defended himself. "And I told you, Keller won't go back there anyway."

"So, when I said 'No,' what you heard was 'Yeah, go right ahead and do it yourself, in the middle of the night?!'"

Neal shrugged. "Pretty much."

"Unbelievable!"

"Wait a second. You can't be mad at me! I didn't even break any of your 'house rules.' I didn't steal anything!"

Neal's finger found the two twenties in his jeans pocket and he tried to look for someplace to put them. It didn't really count as stealing, since he had changed his mind, so he had technically only _borrowed_ the money.

In that moment, Elizabeth, who had probably heard all the yelling, joined them with a "Thank God you're okay!" which distracted Peter for a second, so that Neal could inconspicuously put the money into a nearby drawer.

But Peter wasn't distracted for long. "'Don't sneak out of the house without telling anyone, especially in the middle of the night' was kind of a given!" he continued yelling at him.

"Well then you should have _said_ so! Don't blame me if you weren't specific enough."

Peter shook his head exasperatedly. "I don't have time for this. We actually have to get up early tomorrow. You—" He waved his finger in Neal's face for emphasis. "—are grounded till the end of time. Now off to bed with you!"

"What?" Neal huffed out an incredulous laugh. "You can't ground me."

"I think I just did."

"Keller never grounded me." And now Neal really started to get irritated himself. "He let me stay out as long as I wanted!"

"Missing the days when you were living with a murderer, huh?"

"Boys?" El tried to cut in, but Neal talked right over her.

"At least _he_ didn't make me feel like I'm in _prison_!"

"Boys!"Again, they both ignored her.

"Which is where you're gonna end up if you keep going down the path you're on right now!"

El whistled through her teeth, which finally stopped Neal and Peter's shouting match.

"Yelling at each other is not the answer here. It's two fifteen in the morning. You should call off the search party, hon, and then we can all go to bed. Calm down, talk about it tomorrow."

"But I didn't even—," Neal started, but Peter cut him off, this time in a low but authoritative voice.

"If you don't want to spend the night in lock-up, you'll get your ass up there, right now!"

"Fine!" Neal stomped upstairs, but turned around halfway up. "I didn't have to come back at all, you know?!" With that he continued his way to his room, ignoring Peter's, "What is that even supposed to mean?!" and slamming the door shut behind him.

**~ o O o ~**

Even though it had already been a long night, it turned out it was not over yet. Neal was once again plagued by awful dreams of Keller trying to slice him open. Images of blood dripping off the blade of a knife and a feeling of being watched; Keller telling him that he was next, that he couldn't run from him.

For the second night in a row he was embarrassed to realize that he had yelled for Peter in his sleep, which was even more embarrassing in light of their earlier fight. But Peter only turned on the bedside lamp and sat down next to him on his bed. He mumbled things like, _It's okay_, and _You're safe here_, until Neal had calmed down, and then he sat there for a while longer, neither of them saying anything. But just Peter's presence was enough to make Neal feel safe, and because it had been such a long day—and night—Neal fell asleep again very quickly.

TBC . . .

**~ o O o ~**

**I hope everyone who asked for it got the surprise? If I accidentally forgot you, let me know.**

**Again, thank you so much for your reviews. They mean the world to me. It only takes you a minute to write one and you have no idea how happy that would make me. And it took you way longer to read the chapter than to write a review, so you can spare the extra minute, especially since the chapter is so short anyway****—just for you to give you more time to review**** lol.**

**I am also looking for a beta reader. Preferably a quick one (if it takes me two weeks to write a chapter and then it takes you two weeks to beta it, the readers will have to wait a whole month, which I'm trying to avoid). So if you're interested in getting new chapters earlier, the next chapter is already almost finished and I could send it to you today or tomorrow (and this first time, you wouldn't even have to be quick because I only just updated).**


	7. Chapter 7

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 7**

~ o O o ~

The next morning, Elizabeth woke him up bright and early.

"He still mad?" Neal wanted to know warily.

"Oh honey. He was just worried. We both were. And he knows that you know it wasn't okay to just leave the house like that. Or else you wouldn't have gone out the window."

His first instinct was to protest, but then he just sighed. "So what do I do?"

"You apologize, of course. And you promise never to do it again, and maybe that will convince him to let go of the plan to install bars in front of the window."

Neal snorted. "Yeah, like that'd hold me," he mumbled.

El, who had already been halfway out the door, turned around. "What was that?"

Neal smiled innocently at her. "I'll be down in just a bit."

A few minutes later, Neal joined Peter in the kitchen, where he was sitting at the table reading the paper. El was sitting next to him, sipping her coffee. When she saw him come in, she quickly finished her coffee, put the cup into the dish washer, and kissed Peter on the cheek.

"Bye, hon. I'm already late."

On her way out, she winked at Neal encouragingly and left them both alone.

Taking a deep breath, Neal decided to get it over with. "I'm sorry you had to send your agents out to search for me in the middle of the night. Must have been inconvenient.—But it was really just a misunderstanding," he quickly went on. "And in my defense, you wouldn't even have noticed that I was gone if . . . you hadn't noticed."

Peter finally put the paper down and looked at Neal. "Caffrey logic never fails to impress," he said dryly. Then he sighed. "Is there anything else you want to tell me?"

Neal furrowed his brow and tried to think of what Peter might want to hear.

"Maybe about doing something you know I wouldn't approve of?"

"It's way too early for riddles," Neal stated, pouring himself a cup of coffee.

"Breaking any rules lately?" When Neal still didn't say anything, Peter put two twenty dollar bills on the table. "Guess where I found these and where I didn't put them?"

"That doesn't count!" Neal protested immediately.

"Oh yeah?" Peter raised an unamused eyebrow. "How so?"

"Well, for one . . . I didn't know you knew about that."

Peter shook his head incredulously. "That has to be the world's thinnest argument!"

"_And_," Neal continued, "I didn't steal the money. I put it back."

Again, Peter shook his head, this time in an exasperated manner. "I think we should talk about your loose definition of 'stealing.' Also, guess what else I found?"

Neal groaned. "The ten bucks I took from you last week? Because that doesn't count either. We hadn't even agreed on any rules back then."

"What?"

"What?" Neal repeated innocently, who realized quickly that that wasn't what Peter had been talking about.

"Neal!" Peter sure sounded exasperated a lot.

"You can't make me guess this early in the morning!" Neal complained and stifled a yawn. "Why don't you just tell me and be done with it?!"

Peter stood up and left the kitchen—which was fine by Neal. He could eat breakfast in peace. But Peter came back shortly after, Neal's duffel bag in his hands, which he put on the chair next to his.

"Hey! That's mine!" Neal said and tried to make a grab for it, but Peter batted his hands away. Neal hadn't even realized that he had left it behind when he had stomped up to his room the night before.

He was normally never so careless, but somehow, Peter had a way of getting to him, and he had just been so mad the night before. He had actually considered going out the window again, just to show him, but the exhaustion had won and the bed had looked very warm and inviting . . .

While Neal was regretting his own lack of caution, Peter rummaged through his duffel bag with apparently no regard for his privacy and fished out some of his forged documents.

"George Danvary, Charles Fairweather, Sean Cassady," he listed as he threw each passport down onto the table. "Gates, Rydell, Brooks, Armstrong—I really like that one, by the way—Bennett, Monroe . . ."

"You didn't have a warrant."

"Excuse me?"

"I'm just saying, you can't just go through my stuff and . . ."

But Peter wasn't even listening to him. He held one of his fake IDs up and asked, "Nineteen? Seriously? Does anyone even buy that?"

Neal shrugged. "You'd be surprised.—Hey! What are you doing?!" he added alarmed, when Peter took out a huge pair of scissors. Peter raised his eyebrows and sent him a meaningful look, before cutting the first passport into half right in front of his eyes.

"Do you have any idea how long it took to . . . uhm . . . get those?" Neal protested, which of course Peter ignored in favor of destroying more of his aliases.

Neal could barely rescue two IDs by swiping them off the table and putting them into his pockets, while he distracted Peter by trying (and obviously failing) to make a grab for the scissors with the other hand.

Once Peter was finished, he looked at his handiwork contently and then threw the remains of Neal's IDs into the trash.

"Okay, now that that's taken care of, finish your breakfast, we're already late, too."

"I'm coming with you?"

"If you thought I'd leave you alone in my house with the silverware, think again. Don't worry, I'll find something to keep you occupied."

**~ o O o ~**

Peter wasn't kidding. He sat Neal down at an empty desk surrounded by feds, ordered one of his agents one desk over, "Jefferson, keep a close eye on this one!", and gave Neal a bunch of files to sort. Then, just as he was about to leave him there, he turned around once more.

"Oh, and here's a list of house rules."

Neal stared at the papers in his hands incredulously. "Those are three pages."

"Yes."

"Front and back."

"Yes.—And you better familiarize yourself with those. I expect you to be able to recite them by the end of the day."

"You're kidding!"

"Wouldn't want to have any other _misunderstandings_ because I wasn't _specific_ _enough_, now would we?" Peter grinned, before walking off to his office. He had clearly won this round.

But Neal grinned, too. It was on. If there was anything he was good at, it was finding and exploiting loopholes. This game was gonna be fun!

**~ o O o ~**

The day didn't go as smoothly as Peter had hoped. Hughes hadn't been impressed that Peter had brought the kid to work, but had relented when Peter had explained the situation.

Keller hadn't shown up at his apartment, just like Neal had predicted (it had been a long shot anyway), and had apparently gone completely to ground. No leads on his whereabouts whatsoever. So now, they were running the names of some of his associates that Neal had given them, but those were mostly partners Keller had only worked with once, and Neal often only knew their first names or nicknames; so that didn't get them far, either.

Heaving a deep sigh, Peter made his way down to the bullpen to check up on Neal (and more importantly on Agent Jefferson; he felt bad for the guy for having stuck Neal on him). But when he made it to the desk where he'd left Neal, there was no Neal around. Peter felt an all too familiar headache coming on and rubbed his temples.

"Brian just went to the bathroom," a voice brought him out of his contemplations of putting Neal on some sort of leash. Agent Jefferson.

"Where's Neal?" Peter wanted to know, but just as Jefferson asked, "Who?" his sentence fully registered in his brain, _Brian just went to the bathroom._

"Never mind." That kid was going to be the death of him. He better not have left the building!

But Peter had just made a few steps towards the exit, when Neal came his way. He slowed down once he caught sight of him, but then he grinned at Peter and continued on his way towards him.

"Hi there, _Brian_."

Neal flashed one of his trademark smiles. "You like the name?"

"Do that again and I'll make you wear a name tag."

"Wow, you take this whole name thing really serious, huh?"

"It's not your name. You don't just use aliases to introduce yourself to . . . why do I even bother?"

"Beats me," Neal said under his breath.

"Didn't I give you a task?"

"So no bathroom breaks until I'm done?" Neal countered sarcastically.

"Exactly." Peter put his arm around Neal's shoulder and guided him back towards the desk where he had left him earlier.

"Good," Neal said, shoving the stack of files towards Peter. "'Cause I'm done."

"You're . . . what?" Peter looked back and forth between Neal and the files.

"Done.—Oh, and I hope you know that you got the wrong guy here," Neal said, searching for one particular file and showing it to Peter. "I mean, it's not even his signature. It's clearly been forged . . ."

So much for the plan to keep Neal out of trouble by giving him a simple task that would keep him occupied for hours.

This was promising to be a long day at the office . . .

**~ o O o ~**

For the third time in a row, Peter was woken in the middle of the night by someone screaming for him. He groaned and rolled out of bed.

"Go back to sleep, hon," he said, when El made a questioning sound. "I've got this."

He shuffled to Neal's room sleepily and turned on the light on entering. "Neal, wake up, it's just a . . . FBI, don't move!" he yelled, reaching for a gun that wasn't there.

**~ o O o ~**

Please review if you like this fanfiction and want to see more of it. I started working on another fanfiction, too (Suits, great show!), so I have to prioritize on what I feel more people might be interested in. I'll still continue this fanfiction, though, no matter what. It just might take longer to update.


	8. Chapter 8

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 8**

~ o O o ~

While Peter reached for a gun that wasn't there, he was shoved out of the way by Keller, who then proceeded to flee downstairs.

"You okay?" Peter asked Neal, who nodded, eyes wide open and clearly anything but okay.

But he wasn't physically harmed in any way, which was what Peter had wanted to make sure of, before he could think about catching Keller.

"Stay put!" he yelled at Neal over his shoulder. He shortly debated over whether or not to stop in order to get his gun—he would lose valuable time in which Keller could get away, but going after him unarmed would be a stupid thing to do and a risk he couldn't take.

"Hon?" El asked, confused, when he opened the bedside drawer to take out his gun. "What's going on?"

"Stay with Neal! I'm going after Keller," he quickly explained, while he loaded his gun.

"Keller?" El repeated anxiously. But Peter was busy yelling at Neal to keep the door and window closed, before taking off after Keller.

By the time Peter reached the bottom of the stairs, Keller had already made it out the front door, which was wide open.

**~ o O o ~**

Everything happened very quickly. One moment, Keller was in his room and the next, Peter was yelling. Before he could even process any of it, Elizabeth was there, on the phone with the police or the feds, Neal couldn't quite figure out whom. She kept giving him reassuring looks, but she wasn't fooling anyone, since her voice was all shaky.

**~ o O o ~**

Peter looked up and down the street. When he thought he saw something at the end of the road, he chased after it, but all too soon he came to a crossroad and had no idea which way Keller might have gone. As far as he could tell, everything was calm and Keller long gone. What was left behind was just a quiet neighborhood, houses in which people slept peacefully, unaware of what was happening right outside.

He was about to give up when he heard something rustling behind him. Gripping his gun tightly with both hands, he spun around—and cursed when he saw that it was just a cat, roaming the midnight streets.

Taking one last look around, he cursed again. Had he not had to get his gun first, he might have caught Keller. From this moment on, he wouldn't leave his room without his gun ever again! Or at least until Keller was behind bars.

**~ o O o ~**

They were all wide awake—including Satchmo, who followed Peter around as he was talking on the phone, walking from the kitchen to the living room and back.

Neal and El sat on the couch, waiting for Peter to finish his phone call. When Peter finally joined them, he still wouldn't sit down, but kept walking back and forth agitatedly.

"How did he even get by the security system?" he asked angrily of no one in particular.

"Well, that's easy," Neal replied even though no answer had been required. "All he had to do was . . ." He trailed off, when he realized what he was about to say to a federal agent and changed what he had originally intended to say. "I have no idea how one would go about disabling a security system."

"Cut the crap, Neal! A _murderer _was in my _house_ tonight!"

"Hon," El interjected.

"Our house," corrected Peter without taking his eyes off of Neal.

"Hon!"

"What?" Peter asked tersely, finally looking over at Elizabeth, who indicated Neal with her head.

Once Peter looked at him more closely, he noticed how pale the kid was. His hands were shaking ever so slightly, and he flinched when Satchmo brushed by his feet. Peter should have known—he knew Neal better than that, after all, even though it had only been a few days. The kid was just trying to put on a brave front.

Peter sighed. "Hey. You okay?" he asked.

Neal looked up, caught. Then he tried to crack a smile. "Yeah."

When Peter still didn't seem to buy it, he said "Yeah" once more, this time with more conviction. And if Peter still didn't believe him, he at least let the subject drop for now.

Instead, he picked up his pacing again. "Keller made a big mistake today. If he thinks he can come in here and threaten my family . . ."

Peter continued speaking, but Neal stopped listening. _Family._ Peter probably didn't even notice he had said it, and even if he did, he was clearly talking about El. But something in Neal snapped at that word, and he got irrationally angry.

"What are you going to do? Have the FBI on his trail? Try to catch him and arrest him for murder? Oh wait, you're already doing all of that!"

It had been too much. The fear, the adrenaline, mixed with a sense of guilt in light of what he was keeping from Peter—what was hidden upstairs under his pillowcase.

Peter and El both seemed a little stunned at his outburst, but Neal refused to feel guilty about that, too.

"Well, this has been fun. But I'm going back to bed now," he announced and stood up, just to have his path blocked by Peter, who shook his head decisively.

"You're not going anywhere. We're waiting for the protection detail to arrive."

Neal groaned and let himself drop back down onto the couch. _Protection detail_. That was just what he needed.

In that moment, the sound of sirens, distant but growing rapidly closer, became audible. Well, it sure had taken NYPD long enough to get here. Neal sighed. He could just imagine the bunch of questions he'd have to answer. As if Peter's interrogation technique wasn't bad enough . . .

**~ o O o ~**

It was a long time before Neal was on his own again. Peter and El had gone to bed, not without making Neal promise to leave the door open. So Neal had turned off the lights, too, and had waited for well over an hour before he finally dared to get up and quietly close the door.

Then, and only then, did he retrieve the hidden cell phone. He stared at it and thought back to earlier that night.

_Neal woke up very suddenly. Even in the dark, he could make out Keller, who stood next to his bed. Without thinking twice, he called for Peter as loud as he could while trying to untangle himself from the sheets in order to get away from the danger._

_But Keller just threw something onto Neal's bed—something that Neal couldn't make out in the dark—and said in a low voice, "You might wanna keep this between us if you don't want to end up in prison. Would be a shame if Burke had to send you to juvie and you'd have an accident in there."_

_In that moment, the lights went on and Peter's sleepy voice said, "Neal, wake up, it's just a . . ." As soon as he saw Keller, he yelled, "FBI, don't move!"_

_While Keller shoved Peter out of the way and made his escape, Neal finally saw what it was that Keller had thrown onto his bed, and he quickly grabbed the cell._

_By the time Peter turned to him and asked if he was okay, he had already hid it safely away under the covers._

Coming back to the present, Neal turned on the cell. There was only one number programmed into it. He took a deep breath and hit speed dial #1.

Keller picked up on the second ring.

"Hey there, kiddo. Long time no talk." His voice sounded way too chipper for the middle of the night. Or for someone who was on the run from the FBI, for that matter.

"Peter is going to get you," Neal replied, but since he had to keep his voice down, he couldn't make that statement as cold or as intimidating as he had wanted to.

"Oh, it's _Peter_, is it?" Keller asked, and Neal realized his mistake a couple seconds too late. But then all humor left Keller's voice, as he went on, "He's a fed, Neal. Your natural enemy. He'd place the cuffs on you in an instant if he could prove half of what you've done. And he _will _place the cuffs on you if he should get a certain painting with your fingerprints all over it from an anonymous source."

Neal's blood ran cold. The Degas! It seemed like ages ago that he had been so proud carrying that painting out of the museum. But that had been before . . . before.

"Got your attention yet, have I?" Keller's voice penetrated his foggy mind.

"Oh please!" Neal tried to make his voice sarcastic and sure of himself—again not an easy feat when you were whispering—and bluffed for all he was worth, "I told him everything. Burke's way more interested in you."

Keller chuckled. "Nice try. Face it, kiddo. He's the cat, you're the mouse, and sooner or later, he's gonna eat you up."

"Well, you should be happy about that, then. That'd save you the trouble of getting rid of me."

"Get rid of you?" Keller laughed. "Nealie, Nealie." He clicked his tongue. "If I wanted to get rid of you, I would have already sent your fed friends some evidence to put you away. But while we're talking business, a . . . client of mine wants a certain painting. And I thought, since you owe me and all—"

"I _what_?" Neal asked incredulously, and then he listened carefully for a few seconds, hoping he hadn't been too loud and had woken Peter and El. But everything stayed quiet.

At least outside of his room; Keller on the other hand went on, "Even you should know that you don't rat out your fellow thieves. That's just bad form. Anyway, I need a few . . . copies. And I think it would be in both our interests if I got them, don't you?"

Neal bit his tongue to keep quiet. _Fellow thief . . . _yeah right! Try _murderer_!

"Great!" Keller said who obviously took Neal's silence as consent. "I'll text you the details. Oh, and Neal? Don't call this number again, you won't reach me there."

With that, he hung up and all Neal heard was the continuous beep of a disconnected call.

Neal sighed. He thought about Peter and how he always came for him when he needed him, even in the middle of the night if he was just having a nightmare. Peter would probably have a lot to say about working with Keller, even if it was just a harmless job in order to stay _out of _trouble.

Neal somehow doubted that "There's nothing against forging paintings in the house rules" would fly as an excuse.

**~ o O o ~**

Another day at the bureau went by without any news about Keller's whereabouts, even though he had just been in Brooklyn, in Peter's own house, the night before. That man sure knew how to vanish into thin air.

They had decided to just go about their business as usual. Peter had a couple agents follow El to work, even though she had insisted that that wasn't necessary—Keller wasn't after her—but it made Peter feel better. And he hadn't let Neal out of his sight all day.

The only "unusual" thing that happened was when Diana came to talk to him in his office.

"Neal was right about the Coleman case, boss. The signature has definitely been forged."

That distracted Peter from the whole Keller debacle for a moment. He looked up at her to try and figure out if she was serious. He had been about 90 percent sure that the kid had just tried to get a bit attention, yank his chain, which he was pretty good at. Still, he had had Diana look into it, just to be on the safe side.

"You're kidding me."

"Wish I were, seeing as it took even the experts a second look to figure it out. How did Neal know?"

"I have no idea. He's just full of surprises, isn't he?" Peter said, shooting a look down at Neal sorting another bunch of files. A small smile spread across his face despite himself. He should feel exasperated that his agents had missed something that a fifteen-year-old picked up on, but instead he felt a strange swelling in his chest.

"So, what do you want me to do about it?" Diana's voice brought him out of his thoughts.

"Seems like we have to reopen this case."

**~ o O o ~**

The day had been boring to say the least. Peter wouldn't let him out of his sight, and he got the impression that he was being (mis-)used as a fed-courier. "Neal, can you get this file? Can you get that file? Can you staple and photocopy the paperwork?" You would think they'd have agents for these kinds of tasks!

But on the bright side, it had given Neal time to think about his options concerning the whole Keller situation—not that his contemplations had gotten him anywhere, yet.

He was currently sitting in the living room with Peter. Some sort of cartoon Neal wasn't paying attention to was on in the background, and Peter had taken work home with him and was reading through some files.

Neal shot Peter a sideways glance and worried his lip. On the one hand, he couldn't confess any of his crimes to a fed if he didn't want to end up in prison. On the other hand, though, Peter knew that he had done stuff—stuff for which he could arrest him, _should _probably arrest him. And he hadn't. Yet. Granted, that was mainly due to lack of evidence, but . . . Maybe if he just talked to him . . .? Neal took a deep breath.

"I know that you know . . . you know?"

Peter looked up and raised his eyebrows questioningly. When Neal didn't continue, he gave him his best suspicious-and-exasperated-yet-fond look, which made Neal's heart constrict when he thought of what he was about to tell him.

"What did you do now, Neal?" Peter prompted with a small sigh, setting down the files he had been looking over.

"Nothing! Yet," he added under his breath, too quiet for Peter to catch. "It's just . . . I mean . . . Do you ever not-arrest people?"

Peter wrinkled his brow. "I not-arrest people all the time. I'm not-arresting you right now."

"Oh, come on!" Neal said exasperatedly. "You know what I mean."

"I can honestly say I have no idea what you're trying to tell me. Mind giving it a try in English?"

"When we first met," Neal began hesitantly.

But before he could go on, they heard the front door, and seconds later Elizabeth came in.

"Hey, hon. Hey, Neal," she greeted them as she put her purse down and joined them.

"Hi," Neal said. "So how was your day?"

But before she could answer, Peter cut in, "Neal was just about to tell me something," giving El a meaningful look.

"That's okay," Neal said quickly. "Wasn't important," he mumbled and got up.

On his way up the stairs, he heard Peter say to El, "Yeah, he's definitely up to something. I just hope it's nothing too serious that will blow up in his face."

**~ o O o ~**

I would love to get a review from you to help motivate me to continue with chapter 9. Unfortunately, without that motivation I tend to slack off and don't get any work done. So, it's in your hands if you want a quick update.

With all those lovely reviews on the last chapter, you didn't give me any choice but to write chapter 8 quickly. Each and every one of your reviews is highly appreciated and held close to my heart. And as a thank you for all your wonderful encouragement, it's not only a quick update, but even a longer chapter than usual.

I'm sorry for those who're not into Suits, but I'm also looking for a beta for that fanfiction.


	9. Chapter 9

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 9**

~ o O o ~

Neal hadn't heard back from Keller yet, but he didn't doubt that the text message would arrive, and probably sooner rather than later. So in the meantime, he'd have to get the tools he needed to make whatever forgery he'd be asked to do. Only, good art supplies weren't cheap. Which was why the next evening, he waited till the baseball game Peter was watching was over and then made his move.

"So. Let's talk about an allowance," he said casually.

Peter choked on his beer. "A what now?"

"An allowance," Neal repeated patiently. "I mean, I know how to get stuff that I need, but you don't approve of my methods—there's this whole section on 'no taking, no stealing, no borrowing without asking' in the house rules. So it's really in your best interest to provide me with a more . . . well, _legal _means to get what I want.—I'm thinking along the lines of a hundred bucks. A week."

"Yeah, I just bet that's what you're thinking. Well, think again," Peter said and took a long swig from his beer bottle—which made Neal want to say something to make him choke again. But he suppressed the urge, because the conversation that would follow an 'oh by the way, I talked to Keller' was not one he was keen on having.

"Ninety-five bucks?" he tried to bargain instead, hoping for a reasonable counter offer.

But Peter either didn't get the concept of bargaining or he was simply not in the mood, because he just shot Neal a "you've got to be kidding me" look.

"Come on," Neal complained, stressing the second syllable. "I even worked for it really hard. Sorting all those files at the bureau might have emotionally traumatized me for life.—You wouldn't want me to sue you over child labor abuse, would you?"

"You're the one who always says that you're not a kid anymore," Peter pointed out.

"You're the one who always says that I _am_ still a kid!"

They looked at each other for a few seconds, neither of them giving in. Then both realized simultaneously that they were in a stalemate, and Peter heaved a sigh.

"What is it that you think you need?"

_Art supplies so that I can forge paintings for the criminal you're after_. It would probably be better to keep that part to himself and instead deflect if he didn't want to outright lie to Peter. "New York is a very expensive city. Come to think of it, a hundred a week will hardly be enough to survive."

Peter seemed to mull this over. "Alright," he finally relented. "I'll give you a hundred a week."

"Really?" That had been way easier than expected.

"Sure. But you owe me rent and food and the money for the clothes El bought you . . . I think all in all, _you_ owe _me_ at least a hundred a week. So you better start earning your money's worth at the bureau. No more slacking off!" he said sternly, but a self-satisfied smirk belied his words.

Neal decided that all that merited was a dark look and a dryly stated, "Funny."

Peter grinned. "I'm trying."

But Neal wasn't about to give up that easily. "Seriously, Peter. You have no idea how easy it would have been for me to just pick a few pockets. It has to count for something that I didn't and came to you instead, right?"

But apparently it did not, because Peter shook his head disbelievingly. "You were with me the whole time. When could you possibly have picked some pockets?! "

Neal gave Peter a meaningful look. "Do you really want me to answer that?"

"What I really want you to answer is what it is that you need money for.—I thought we did a pretty decent job of providing for you so far."

Since the best lie was always based on a foundation of truth, Neal decided to reveal at least part of the reason why he needed the money. "I should be able to do something fun in the evenings. Seeing as I already have a _curfew_—" His tone of voice made it very clear what he thought of the concept. "—it's simply not fair to make me watch boring baseball games when we get home."

"Seriously? You don't like baseball?" Peter asked, surprised (apparently he hadn't noticed Neal's deliberate bored sighs that had become increasingly louder as the game had gone on). "Huh.—So what would _you_ like to do?"

Neal shrugged. "I like to paint occasionally." An understatement, but not a lie.

In that moment, El came in. "Hey boys. Is the game already over?"

"Yeah. Finally!" Neal said with an exaggerated long-suffering sigh. "Say, Elizabeth, how much money do you think I should get a week?"

Peter rolled his eyes and shook his head to El behind Neal's back—which Neal of course noticed anyway. Without thinking about it, he pounced on Peter to keep him from signaling El and trying to get her on his side. Peter was so surprised, he almost fell off the couch, all the while El's melodious laughter was ringing through the room.

**~ o O o ~**

When the weekend came around, Neal was getting nervous. Keller still hadn't sent the announced text message. He was up in his room all day, waiting for some sign from Keller, even though he knew he would probably only contact him at night, anyway.

Also, if he had to tell Keller that he didn't have the necessary supplies, he would probably assume that Neal was trying to con him or that it was just some sort of stalling technique.

Which, granted, would be something Neal might try, but the (sad) matter of the fact was that Peter seemed immune against his charms. He seriously hadn't caved, even though Neal had tried out his innocent look, his bored look, his seriously-bored look—combined with various boredom activities he knew drove Peter crazy (from playing around with a rubber band ball he had found lying around at the bureau to repeatedly picking Peter's pocket throughout the day).

Not that Neal could really blame him. He couldn't seriously expect Peter to spend money on him. Or at least not any more than he already was. The clothes El had bought for him were pretty decent. More than that actually, if he were honest with himself. And Peter hadn't asked for this.

With Keller it had been different. It had always been about a mutually beneficial arrangement. Peter on the other hand didn't really get anything out of this deal. Apart from all the information Neal could give him on Keller—but Neal had already given him that, and now Peter was stuck with him, having to provide for him for the time being. And the only way Neal knew how to give something back was obtaining money through means that Peter was very clear about were not an option.

"What are you moping about?" Peter's voice brought him out of his thoughts.

"I'm not moping," Neal denied automatically.

"Well," Peter said as he sat down next to Neal, "I got something for you that might help you stop not-moping." With that, Peter held out a bag for Neal to take, a self-satisfied grin on his face.

Neal shot him a suspicious took—a smirky Peter was usually no good news for him—but then he took the contents out of the bag nevertheless. It contained some colorful pencils, a box of watercolors and a sketch block.

Neal was about to make a sarcastic comment and maybe even laugh a little about Peter's joke, even though it fell rather flat, when suddenly he realized that it wasn't some sort of trick Peter was playing on him.—His expression said it all: it wasn't his "gotcha!" grin, but a friendly smile and he was obviously pleased with himself and his "surprise". In short, Peter genuinely thought these kinds of "art supplies" were what Neal had had in mind.

But Neal wasn't the best con his age for nothing, and so he plastered on a huge grin himself—he wouldn't want Peter to feel bad, when all he had wanted was to do something nice for him—and said, enthusiastically, "Thank you! This is great!"

In his thoughts, however, he was already thinking about a different source of income. There was no way he could forge _any_ painting with watercolors that school kids used for art class.

He had tons of ideas how to get the supplies he needed—unfortunately, none of them legal. Well, what Peter didn't know, wouldn't hurt him. And the house rules were more like guidelines, anyway . . .

"You're welcome," Peter replied in the meantime in a warm tone of voice and ruffled Neal's hair.

Neal glowered at him for that and patted his unruly hair that Peter had messed all up down again. But then he had to smile again, this time an honest smile, because it was actually very nice of Peter to give him these—albeit not exactly forger-friendly—art supplies. Especially since Peter didn't _have_ to buy him anything. Who knew, maybe his charm was working on Peter, after all.

"So," Peter said, getting up and taking a step towards the door. "You're busy, then? I can go watch my game, without having to worry about you blowing our house up or something?"

"I think you're safe. I don't do explosives."

Peter huffed out a laugh, mumbled something like "Good to know" and finally left him alone.

Even though Neal hadn't gotten what he had actually wanted, trying to con Peter into getting him art supplies had been less of a con than he had thought. Turned out he really had missed painting more than he had realized.

He liked to paint for fun, sure, but he also used painting as a coping mechanism. To clear his head or to deal with stress . . . and these last few days had been _very_ stressful. Moving in with a fed, trying to make a run for it, changing his mind and going back, getting a midnight visit from the person he had believed wanted to kill him, getting blackmailed . . .

So even though Neal would have to get some _real _art supplies soon, Peter's surprise hadn't been completely in vain. Neal decided that for now, sketching would have to do, and so he took one of the pencils and the sketch block and just started, not even knowing himself yet what he wanted to draw.

While his hands were working on the sketch, his mind was busy coming up with a plan how to thwart Keller. He could play along, forge the painting and find out when the heist was supposed to go down. Then all he had to do was tip off the feds and he'd be rid of Keller . . .

Now if only he knew why he didn't feel as good about his plan as he should.—It was foolproof after all.

**~ o O o ~**

After the game was over, Peter realized that he hadn't seen or heard from Neal in an unusually long time.

"What is it?" El asked, who was sitting on the couch with him, her head on his shoulder, looking up at him.

"Huh?" Peter said, coming out of his thoughts.

"You have that frown on your face that means something's troubling you," El explained, leaning in to kiss away his frown.

Once she leaned back again, Peter said, "I don't think it's been this quiet in our house since before last Saturday."

That got a raised eyebrow from El, so Peter elaborated, "Since before a certain someone became our house guest. There's only one possible explanation. Neal's up to something.—I should go check on him."

El laughed at that and seemed to be hardly able to stop. "Honey. Don't you think that you're a little too suspicious of him? You _always _think he's up to something."

"That's because he always _is_ up to something," Peter grumbled.

"Well, if it makes you feel better, go see what our teenager is doing. But don't forget: a little trust every once in a while goes a long way."

"Trust, but verify," Peter replied, getting up.

Neal was sitting on his bed, drawing intently, so immersed in his activity that he didn't even look up when Peter came in.

"What are you drawing?" Peter asked, coming closer.

Neal's head shot up at that and he quickly turned his sketch block around so that Peter couldn't see what he'd been drawing. "Nothing.—You know, just sketching around."

"Ah," Peter said, nodding his head. "So . . . you've just been up here drawing this whole time?"

"Yeah," Neal said slowly, shooting him a strange look. "Was there some sort of reason why you're interrupting me or did you just want to make sure that I wasn't robbing you blind because you left me alone for three minutes?"

"Try three hours."

"Well, since you checked up on me and all your possessions are still in the right place—do you mind?" Neal looked pointedly at the door.

"Not at all," Peter replied good-naturedly, sitting down with Neal. The kid's obvious attempt at hiding away his painting from him had made him curious. It was better not some plan to rob a museum or something . . .

While Neal was busy groaning and scooting over, Peter made a quick grab for the sketch block, turning it over. Neal frantically tried to get it back, but he was too slow.

It was not a plan of a teenage criminal mastermind. Far from it. In fact, it was a very detailed drawing of a scene in a park. People were walking along paths and sitting on park benches—an old man feeding birds, and a young couple pushing a baby buggy. A perfect snapshot in time of a happy, sunny day in the park.

And there, at the edge of the paper were Peter and El, walking arm in arm, looking out at the meadow, where Neal was playing with Satchmo near a lake. You could even make out the ducks diving for food, even though they were in the background, the details so minute that Peter wondered if you needed a magnifier to take a better look at the picture.

This—could not be the work of a fifteen-year-old kid! Could it? Peter looked up at Neal, whose ears had turned slightly pink.

"I want that back!" Neal declared testily and snatched the block out of Peter's hands.

Peter was still baffled, but he composed himself and said, "That is _very_ accurate!"

"I know," Neal replied in a _thanks for stating the obvious_ tone. "I don't quite remember her face, though," he added after a short pause, tapping the woman pushing the baby buggy.

On closer inspection, the woman's facial features lacked the detailed precision of everyone else in the drawing. Nothing that Peter would have noticed himself at all.

"She was there?" Peter asked surprised.

"Sure," Neal replied, shrugging his shoulders. "You didn't see them?"

"Well, let's just say I certainly wouldn't remember every detail about her face, either."

Neal shrugged again, and then he ripped out the page and crumpled it up. Before Peter could protest, he explained, "I've been trying to get her face right for half an hour."

"You know, we could always take Satch to the park again, tomorrow, if you want. See if we can find new people and new faces."

Neal's eyes were shining and he started enthusiastically, "Yeah, that would be . . ." But then he broke off and his smile faded away. "Or, I don't know. Maybe tomorrow isn't the best time. I'll probably do some more drawing."

Peter's alarm bells started ringing again. "Something wrong?" he asked.

Apparently Neal sensed what Peter's real concern was, because he looked him right in the eye and said, "Don't worry. I'm not planning anything."

And Peter probably would have even believed him—if he hadn't heard that tone of voice before. When Neal had insisted he just wanted to go home to his parents for dinner. And then again, when he had denied that he knew anything about Keller, that it was just a coincidence that he had run into Peter. And basically every time since then when he insisted that he was okay when Peter woke him up from a nightmare, even though Peter had seen the terror in his eyes in that one moment when Neal hadn't yet realized that it was just a nightmare, somewhere between dream and consciousness.

"Okay," Peter said, regardless, letting it go for now. Even though the alarm bells in his head were ringing louder than ever.

**~ o O o ~**

The long awaited text message arrived exactly at 1:05 am. Apparently, Neal wouldn't have had to worry about art supplies—Keller would provide everything he needed.

At 1:07, Neal took a deep breath. It was time to go meet with Keller . . .

**~ o O o ~**

Review if you want to see more of this fanfiction. It helps me prioritize which project I should work on, and it can suck the motivation away to post something and get nothing in return. You don't have to be registered on this site to leave a review.


	10. Chapter 10

~ o O o ~

**A Place Called Home**

**Chapter 10**

~ o O o ~

Having learned from his mistakes the last time, Neal arranged the pillows to make it look like he was still in bed, before he quietly opened the door and sneaked out. He slowly made his way down the stairs, careful not to make them creak.

He had just made it to the bottom of the stairs, when suddenly the lights came on, startling Neal and making him almost trip over a sleeping Satchmo.

Neal looked around and saw Peter sitting on the couch in the living room, half of his face cast in shadows. "Going somewhere?"

Trying to act as if he hadn't been caught on his way out, Neal said lightly, "Have you been sitting there the whole night just so you could scare me like that?"

Peter ignored Neal's quip and instead asked wearily, "Didn't we just have this conversation the other day?"

"Don't think so. I'd remember if you had pulled this 'lurking in the dark' bit before. Creepy, I'll give you that."

Peter shook his head. He looked disappointed and strangely exhausted in the dim light. "Don't," he simply said, and Neal felt his insides clench. A disappointed Peter was way worse than an angry Peter could ever be.

Peter motioned for Neal to sit with him, and Neal hesitantly complied.

After a short pause in which neither of them said anything, Neal was the first to speak. "I wasn't gonna run. I just really have to take care of something," he said and lowered his eyes so that he wouldn't have to look at Peter's disappointed frown anymore.

"And what might that be?" Peter asked with a neutral inflection.

Neal avoided eye contact for a few more seconds, before he finally looked up at Peter imploringly. "Can't you just trust me?" he asked and his tone came out more desperately than intended. "I'll be back by morning."

"Yeah. That sounds real trustworthy." Peter sighed, shaking his head a little as he buried his face in his hands.

When he looked up at Neal again, his eyes bore intensely into the young boy. "Whatever it is, don't do it, Neal." He wouldn't let Neal look away, as if he wanted to make sure that whatever it was he was about to say got through to him. "I know you've had to take care of things on your own in the past, but I don't know if you've realized yet: you don't have to anymore. There are other people who can help you. There's me. And El. And we can take care of whatever it is you think you need to take care of in the middle of the night."

"I know, but . . ."

"Do you?" Peter interrupted him.

"But this is really something I need to do by myself," Neal continued urgently, willing Peter to understand.

"No you don't."

"Yes, I do."

"You don't," Peter repeated emphatically. "Ask yourself this: What good could possibly come from whatever shenanigans you're up to now? Not to mention that your way of 'taking care of things' usually makes them worse."

"Does not," Neal mumbled.

"Point is, you can always come and talk to me," Peter continued and he seemed so earnest that Neal oh-so-desperately wanted to believe him.

"Can I?" he snapped at Peter instead.

"Yes, of course," Peter said, apparently confused by Neal's harsh response.

"Oh, really?" Neal said, making his disbelief clear in his tone of voice. "'Cause I never know if I'm talking to _Peter_ or to _Agent Burke_!" he spat.

Instead of reacting to Neal's angry tone, Peter's features cleared and he nodded understandingly. "So _that's_ what this is about. Your illegal activities."

"Alleged illegal activities," Neal corrected, but the fight had gone out of him as fast as it had come.

Peter looked at him contemplatively for a moment. Then, without a word, he took out his FBI badge and put it on the table in front of Neal.

Neal eyed it suspiciously and when Peter didn't say or do anything else, he picked up the badge. He turned it around in his hands, inspecting it closely and memorizing the details just in case he'd ever have to forge an FBI badge. Once he had looked at it from every angle, he put it back down and looked up at Peter again.

"Just so we're clear . . ." he started but then trailed off, because he really needed to hear Peter say it to be sure.

"There's no agent around to arrest you right now. Whatever you want to tell me—you can."

Immunity! He was basically given carte blanche, and Neal knew that a better chance would never come along. So he took a deep breath.

"The night that you caught me near that museum . . . I was working with Keller. I helped him steal those paintings," he admitted in a rush.

A crease appeared on Peter's forehead, but he didn't seem impressed. "I already knew that."

"Yeah, but you couldn't prove it. Keller can."

"So?" The crease on Peter's forehead deepened as he was obviously trying to figure out what Neal's problem was. "What makes you think Keller would be interested in implicating himself just to get back at you?"

And there was the million dollar question— the one he really didn't want to answer. "He kinda . . . told me?"

"He what?" Peter furrowed his brow in confusion.

"Now, don't get mad. But I talked to him on the phone and . . ."

"You _what_?—Wait, what phone? Where did you even get his number? He ditched his old cell."

". . . and he said he'd send the painting I . . . 'took without asking' to the FBI if I didn't help him with something."

Peter just looked at him for a moment, his face turning a shade of red Neal was already all too familiar with.

"This better be a joke, because you think it's funny to see how long it will take to give me a stroke."

"You promised!" Neal warned who wasn't too fond of Peter's angry tone.

"I promised not to arrest you," Peter countered. "Do you see me arresting you?"

"Sneaky," Neal acknowledged appreciatively.

But the humor was lost on Peter. "This is not a game we're playing here, Neal!"

"That's what losers say," Neal interjected quietly, but Peter was in full lecture mode and didn't hear the comment.

"You're obviously a very bright and talented kid and you know it. But if you keep making the wrong choices, that won't be enough. I can't protect you from yourself."

"No one's asking you to," Neal replied mulishly.

Peter pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. "What does Keller want your help with?"

"Just some painting stuff . . ." When Peter continued looking at him, Neal thought, in for a penny, in for a pound, and clarified, "He wants me to forge a Goya."

"Neal, my badge is still on the table," Peter pointed out, unimpressed. "The whole sense of this exercise was for a bit more honesty."

"What, you think I'm lying?" Neal asked indignantly.

And that's when the penny dropped. Neal was surprised he didn't see an actual light bulb come on over Peter's head. "Neal?" Peter asked warily. "Those forgeries I asked you about that very first day? Tell me you didn't make those!"

"I didn't make those?" Neal repeated dutifully.

"Dammit, Neal!" And then, after a moment. "Really?—I mean, they were so . . . flawless."

"Why thank you," Neal said, trying to play the compliment down, even though it made him feel all warm and giddy. He knew how good he was, and other people who had seen his forgeries had told him often enough, but somehow hearing Peter praise his work . . . it meant something in a way that it never had before, coming from someone else.

His comment seemed to bring Peter out of it again. "No! That was not meant as encouragement!" he clarified quickly.

"Noted," Neal reassured him, but the warm feeling was still there. There were no take backs on compliments.

"Wait a sec!—Did you seriously come to me to ask for supplies that you needed for _forging a painting_?!"

"Relax! It's not like those pencils you gave me would have gotten me very far."

"_Un_believable!"

"What would you rather have me do—come to you and ask for the supplies, or steal them?"

Peter shook his head incredulously. "None of the above!"

"That wasn't a potential answer. Hence the question what you'd _rather _have had me do."

"Depends. What would you rather be arrested for?"

"Touché."

After that, Peter slipped back into interrogation mode, asking tons of questions, about how Neal had communicated with Keller, what Keller had said, what the text message had said exactly. Apparently, even when Peter set his badge aside, he couldn't just turn off the agent deep inside.

They talked until the early hours of the morning, until they were both about ready to fall asleep on the spot and their voices almost gave out.

"Okay, here's what we're going to do," Peter said. "You wait for Keller to contact you again and when he asks why you didn't show up, you tell him that I caught you sneaking out . . ."

"As if I'd let myself get caught," Neal interjected.

Peter shot him a significant look.

"Point taken."

"And you tell him you have to reschedule," Peter went on. "Once you have a new place and time, I'll take my team and instead of you, he'll meet us at the rendezvous point, and instead of a Goya, he'll get a one-way ticket to prison."

That actually sounded like a better plan than his own. Neal felt as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. He didn't have to meet up with Keller at all. Peter would take care of it. And Neal himself wouldn't be sent to prison. Immunity rocked!

"Forgeries!" Peter shook his head. "Just so you know, that one is going into the house rules!"

"Under 'chores,' as in, 'forge at least one painting every week,' right?" Neal asked, for which he finally got a chuckle out of Peter.

Neal felt his spirits lifting. Whatever anyone wanted to say about Peter Burke, at the end of the day, he was a very forgiving person, and he was great at giving second chances. He might be aggravated and exasperated by Neal more often than not, but even when he was angry with him, he couldn't seem to stay mad for long.

**~ o O o ~**

Maybe to be continued? Depends on whether you guys are interested to see more. Let me know. I had originally planned more, but this would also make for a sort of open ending. No cliffhanger this time and I tried to round it off a bit for you, since it's the middle of summer and people are apparently not as interested right now.

I would also love to hear from all those followers and silent readers who have been reading along but have never left a review before, now that the fanfiction is finished. I think I deserve a short review if you've followed this fanfiction right till the end.


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